Today's papers reveal the tragic story of Chris Mapletoft, 18, who died after taking 'slimming aid' DNP. But worryingly, diet pills like this are still readily available. Cosmo investigates...

Chris Mapletoft, 18, was a star pupil and promising rugby player, hoping to embark on a business degree at university. But instead, Chris has become the latest young person to die after taking the banned fat-burning pill, known as DNP. Worryingly, the number is still growing and earlier this year, talented medical student Sarah Houston, 23, died after secretly taking the drug at her student house in Leeds. Earlier this year, we reported on the deadly fat-burning pill forcing young people to risk their lives without realising...

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Next to her bed was a handwritten note: 'If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way.' These words, say family and friends, perfectly summed up medical student Sarah Houston. But one morning, when her flatmate in their Leeds student house went to check Sarah was alright, her body lay motionless. Despite her family believing she'd nearly conquered bulimia – a battle she'd been fighting for nine years – Sarah had been taking a slimming pill called DNP, which she'd bought online, for the past 18 months. It was a secret she'd hidden from everyone around her, but which ultimately cost the student her life. In September 2012, Sarah, 23, complained of feeling hot and breathless. Although she didn't reveal it, she'd taken what turned out to be a fatal dose of DNP, a pesticide banned for human consumption in the UK but openly and legally sold on the internet from abroad as a quick-fix weight-loss pill.

Sarah's death isn't isolated. The pills that took the worst possible toll on her body have taken other lives. According to last year's Journal Of Medical Toxicity, DNP can be linked to more than 60 deaths around the world, including three in the UK. It causes weight loss by interfering with our ability to produce ATP (a hormone that provides energy), which makes the body burn fat to meet its energy demands. But the main side effect is an elevation in body temperature and sweating. People who have overdosed on DNP liken it to 'cooking from the inside.' The Food Standards Agency has warned that if people consume the drug, widely available online, it can lead to 'nausea, vomiting, restlessness, flushed skin, sweating, dizziness, headaches, rapid respiration and irregular heartbeat, possibly leading to coma and death.'

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Dr Michael Coysh, an A&E registrar, warns, "It's impossible to know how much of the active ingredient is contained in these unregulated tablets. But no amount of DNP is ever safe – it's not designed for humans." But it's not just DNP that's sold as a quick fix. Put 'diet pills' into a search engine and you'll see a plethora of professional-looking websites. 'Lose up to 20 pounds of fat in your first month!' claims one. 'Lose between 8-15 pounds in a month WITHOUT changing your diet!' boasts another. Danni Tripp, 20, hit the headlines after suffering a fatal heart attack in 2011 from taking 20 Dexaprine – slimming pills containing the stimulant DMAA – that she bought online. During the inquest into her death, it was revealed that the quantity of pills she took delivered a caffeine hit equivalent to drinking 40 cups of coffee. Like DNP, DMAA has been withdrawn from sale in the UK but is still legally sold from abroad online.

In recent months, sales of slimming pills have surged. Forza – a manufacturer of legitimate, food-derived diet pills – reported a 600% spike in UK sales on Amazon between 1-12 April, following the Easter chocolate binge and the first glimpses of sun. It's harder to track the sales of less reputable dealers, but when Cosmo contacted UK slimming clinics who sell high-strength diet pills – one variety banned by the NHS due to dangerous side effects – they revealed their business doubled in April. Personal trainer Laura Williams says the extended bad weather prompted exercise and diet habits to fall by the wayside: "I heard people who've trained for years saying, 'I just can't do it. All I want to do is eat.'" When the body is low in vitamin D – as it is in long winters with little sunlight – serotonin (the happy hormone) levels drop, which leads to carb cravings as these boost those hormones – and in turn, our mood. With the arrival of better weather, people might be tempted to turn to diet pills as a quick fix to get in shape, but if they opt to buy them online, the lack of regulation makes this comparable to playing Russian roulette. Cases like Sarah's and Danni's highlight the failure of law-enforcement agencies to tackle the problem of the drugs being marketed as slimming pills on the internet. Thousands of different diet pills are currently on sale. Some are legal; others not. Many are simply ineffectual or work as a placebo; some are potentially fatal.

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Many prescription-only pills are sold online without prescription. As quickly as one tablet is banned for having illegal ingredients, another appears – and there's the added complication of companies getting round legal loopholes by marketing pills with clever wording. One newspaper investigation into DNP found it still being sold by UK companies who told buyers the pills would be labelled as vitamins to get through the postal system without sounding alarm bells. Dr Adam Kay, an expert in women's health, says, "When you're buying online – if you're on a well-known UK high-street retailer's website, or it's a product you've seen on a reputable store shelf, chances are you won't be doing yourself any harm. Anything else, don't do it. Or at the very least, speak to your doctor first. "Unless you have a pharmacology degree, you can't offer advice to someone browsing a website for diet pills other than be very careful. Essentially there isn't any way to tell what pills are dangerous without going through every single active ingredient and checking them all. But the bad ones don't always list their ingredients."
Doctors also warn that bulk buying of pills means there's no control over the doses taken. "Ordering any medication over the net is dangerous," says Dr Coysh. "It's generally unregulated, meaning it won't go through the same safety checks that you get with a prescription drug, so you have no idea exactly what the tablets contain or what levels of substances are within them. Some contain potentially fatal chemicals; others contain nothing at all, but it's a lottery."

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At the inquest into Sarah Houston's death, her dad Geoff said, "Nobody knew she was taking the drug – not even her flatmates. It would be posted to her… in a brown paper bag."
With other tablets, the side effects can be emotional as well as physical – as Rebecca O'Connor, 23, from Widnes discovered: "I've tried different diet pills in the past. One promised I'd lose inches fast, but within weeks I felt the side effects. I began losing my temper over the smallest things and was sleeping badly – it felt like I was on a high from class-A drugs. Sometimes I'd survive on just a Galaxy Ripple all day. Although I lost weight, I stopped taking them because I felt so horrendous." Rebecca's side effects were a warning of what can develop into a dangerous addiction. "It's bad, but I still get the urge to buy slimming tablets online, especially before a girly holiday when I would feel most self-conscious," she says. "I've tried others marketed for body builders, like Semtex – a legal fat burner. But I saw no results so I stopped."
After Sarah Houston's inquest, her family said they intended to lobby the government to clamp down on DNP because, although her death may have been partly down to the combination of the pills with an antidepressant she was taking, the coroner said he laid the blame "entirely at the door of DNP". Police believe banning the substance outright could be tricky as it is legitimately used as a pesticide. But other groups, including eating-disorder support group Beat, are backing calls for tighter regulations. A spokesperson for the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency said, "This tragic case has highlighted the potential dangers of buying slimming pills online. We urge people not to take any slimming medicines or products bought online without consulting a pharmacist or doctor. It's not worth the danger to overall health to buy and use these products as you don't know what is in them. Any weight-loss results they offer come with a huge risk."

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